Case Study: Finding Psychological Safety after Trauma
Denise’s story illustrates how Solution Focused therapies can help heal Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, rebuild a sense of self, and create a more hopeful future.
By Jane Pendry
Sense-Ability therapies can help people grow and flourish
Rewind Trauma Therapy
Sense-Ability Rewind Trauma Therapy helped Denise painlessly process and resolve past traumas; while Solution Focused Hypnotherapy empowered her to imagine, create, and realise a better future aligned with her values and motivations.
All talked out and ready to move on
Having undertaken many years of talking therapy, and uncovered her real passions, personality and interests, Denise had great clarity about who she was and what she wanted in life. However, she still carried some trauma from the past and didn't feel anchored and secure enough to get back to work.
Ready for somatic healing
After trying many therapeutic approaches, and understanding the root of her Complex PTSD, Denise was looking for a somatic healing approach that would help her develop the psychological and physiological safety she needed to move forward in life.
Denise was also hoping to imagine and manifest a more fulfilling career and a happier and healthier future.
“Jane has, quite literally, given me my life back. Through the deceptively simple techniques she uses, Jane has helped me to overcome my past and now I can look forward to a future of love and joy”
Denise writes …
“Having a couple of breakdowns and been diagnosed with clinical depression before my mid twenties, I was offered many different medications. They didn't help much.
“Nevertheless, I coped by throwing myself into my career and changing jobs and flats frequently. Over many years I tried Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Schema Therapy, Compassion Based Therapy and Mindfulness. They all helped in different ways; some more than others. However, despite the years of therapy, I still had issues with relationships and struggled with work life balance.
“I managed to hold it together until I changed career. Realising I'd made a big mistake; I left within the week! Redundancy, homelessness and other stressful events followed. My mental health unravelled.
A diagnosis of Complex PTSD
“One day, in my mid forties, I woke up and just couldn’t leave the house to go to work. I was totally burnt out. Then a perceptive Psychotherapist diagnosed me with Complex PTSD (Complex Childhood Trauma) rooted in childhood experiences. It was a light-bulb moment. At last, I had a diagnosis that made sense.
“The thought of going to yet another therapist and taking about past issues yet again left me cold. Emotional dysregulation was keeping me isolated. The thought or returning to work made me ill. I was all talked out and needed something else.
Needing psychological safety
“But what? I felt stuck and couldn’t move forward?
“I knew that my mind needed to learn that I was safe now. What had happened to me in the past (emotional neglect) was not my fault and needn't define who I am now.
““That was when I found Jane Pendry at Sense-Ability. Her complementary Solution Focused somatic approach to healing just clicked, like the missing piece of a jigsaw puzzle.”
“That was when I found Jane Pendry at Sense-Ability. Her complementary Solution Focused somatic approach to healing just clicked; like the missing piece of a jigsaw puzzle.
“Through the work that Jane and I have done together, my stress and anxiety has gone and I am able to think clearly again. The thought of working and socialising again doesn’t fill me with dread anymore. I am taking a course that will lead to a change in career to something that will make me happy and fulfilled, instead of stressed and lonely.
“Jane has, quite literally, given me my life back. Through the deceptively simple techniques she uses, Jane has helped me to overcome my past. Now I can look forward to a future of love and joy.”
Jane’s Comment
I’m delighted to have helped Denise resolve her last remaining traumas and limiting beliefs after so many years of suffering.
It’s clear that Denise has been on a long journey of self discovery and all her therapies and set-backs steadily moved her forward. Healing from childhood trauma and neglect is a lifelong journey. So much of the healing journey is about regaining personal agency - control over emotions, actions, reactions and decisions.
Sense-Ability Solution Focused approaches are all about giving clients back control. Directed interventions are sometimes added - breathing, mindfulness exercises, NLP modalities - to calm the central nervous system and tone the vagus nerve. Solution Focused conversations help clients move their lives forwards and create goals and preferred futures aligned with authentic values and beliefs. Suggestion based hypnosis helps clients imagine and embed new patterns of thinking, acting, reacting, and ultimately, interacting. It’s an organic client-led process of creating lasting change.
For more information, for an informal chat about how I might help or to book an initial assessment, consultation and neuroscience presentation:
Jane Pendry
BA Hons (London), PGCE (Cantab), DSFH, HPD, AfSFH, ABNLP, ABH, CNCH, IARTT
Sense-Ability Hypnotherapy & Coaching
jane@sense-ability.co.uk
07843 813883
www.sense-ability.co.uk
Wheatley, Oxford, United Kingdom Online across the U.K. and Europe